Pretty Picture Syndrome – An Artists Journey To Life: Day 427

There is still a sense of ‘pointlessness’ to what I am doing with painting landscapes. That is the point I am faced with at the moment. I am linking myself and my art into the system and it just so happens that this seems to have to be done in a very specific way where for instance the art that I must make to do this is actually irrelevant in relation to the actual reality we live in. In essence, it more just perpetuate the current system we have in place instead of pointing to the actual problems of this reality and show that in fact our current system is not working and is not supportive and we require a massive global change and a change on a fundamental level of our existence as human beings to actually develop a sustainable way of life. And so I am finding the art I am making now is not contributing to developing Solutions to developing a world system tat take all beings on earth into consideration as equals that require equal support from birth to death.

There is parts of me that want to run away from this point. To just say forget it, this is useless and go and do something else.

I have been trying to figure out if my experience of wanting to stop making the type of art I am making now and just do something else and dedicate my art to more “things that matter” like exposing the actual world and system for what it really is which at the moment is not a part of my art creation process as this has been more dedicated of late to something that is more “marketable” and so essentially is based on the “pretty picture syndrome” that has infected the art world as well as the world/individual in general.

I see that I actually judge my art that is more personal. That is more revealing in terms of actually showing something that from my perspective informs and educates the viewer instead of just inducing some nostalgic experience through the combination and arrangement of lines and color.

I friend of mine told me that landscape paintings are more marketable and I took it personally.

I don’t even know if they seen my other work, but I still took the point personally in where I then judged my other more ‘personal’ work in a negative way where essentially I experienced myself as ‘inadequate’ and in a point of ‘worthlessness’. I also have a strong belief that I can never sell my more controversial work and that no one would want that. And so I have ended up moving into doing more “pretty picture” type stuff and not putting any time into more ‘personal’ art that is for instance more political or referencing the real psychologically dysfunctional state of humanity – In essence art that really shows the fucked up nature of man which subsequently then would be art that is much more real than art that just shows some corner of existence where things appear to be peaceful meanwhile the chaos and atrocities taking place has been cropped out.

Its interesting because if one look at ones own psychological state they will find that there is nothing peaceful and serene and pretty about it. It actually can be quite nasty or negative or tumultuous where really people are often experiencing some kind of fear, or worry, or something where we are in a constant state of anxiety and fear and yet we identify with Artwork that is like the opposite of what is really going in inside of us. That does make sense because if you look at how we present ourselves, its always some personality or presentation where “everything is fine” and so this would indicate that it is only our ‘personalities’ that we present to the world to hide the real truth of ourselves underneath that is actually identifying with, buying, and ultimately dictating the state of Art.